Ah, finally. A backstory for CJ from GTA San Andreas, obviously after failing to woo Masumi he fell into the wrong crowd and became a gangsta.
Okay, sorry. That joke was too good to pass up. It's a shame I waited this long to play it, been out for awhile huh? On a more serious note, this was a nice hidden gem of a game. Simple, short and enjoyable. Plus I'm in love with Masumi's character design, though I speak from bias as I've always had a fondness for that type of aesthetic. I'm going to start listing all my thoughts now, might be a bit of a long one! If anyone is reading this before completing the game better look away for spoilers I guess?
Anyway, on the actual game, I liked the premise of resetting to the start after CJ fails (does that make this a cross-over with GTA? I kid, I kid). I think those time rewind type of stories have hidden potential. If explored further I would love if it like each path revealed more information on these cast of characters, so you'd be invested to keep going to learn more about them. Especially on the sort of connection between CJ and Masumi.
So correct me if I'm wrong but Masumi doesn't actually feel like a major manic pixie dream girl. From what I understand, the manic pixie girl basically helps a tragic main character to find happiness in their life and break them out of their hardened shell. CJ had a case of love at first sight but Masumi seemed like a normal friend that he had a crush on, not really someone that brought meaning to his life. Now I don't mean this as a criticism! It's just simply an observation. Though I would have liked to see that dynamic between them, would have added some interesting depth to their bond.
Y'know during my playthrough I kept finding myself asking, "why doesn't CJ just ask the time wizard to send him farther back into the past before Masumi had arranged a date?" now I know that it doesn't change anything since the entire point is that she doesn't return his feelings and he has trouble accepting it but I just found it funny since the date is the main inconvenience that CJ is aware of!
Well that about sums it up, that ultimate edition sounds rather interesting but searching up a kickstarter page for it doesn't give me any results. Wouldn't mind more of this game but I can understand if you're a busy person. By the way, I encountered a bug. The last route I did before getting the final ending was the basketball option, that loud and competitive techno sounding music that plays during basketball kept playing as I finished the game. At least it made things far more intense!
Now time to pass out since I played and reviewed this at 4 AM